


Diffraction

by Sub_Rosa



Category: Prism (Manga)
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/F, F/M, Romance, School Life, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-08-06
Packaged: 2018-07-21 23:30:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7409473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sub_Rosa/pseuds/Sub_Rosa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Megumi was just a little girl, she met a little boy named Hikaru by the oceanside.</p><p>Then Megumi grew up, and she met a girl named Hikaru in the heart of the city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A fanfiction for Higashiyama Shou's brilliant yuri manga, Prism, about two childhood friends who meet again and become lovers. The plot bunnies attacked and wouldn't let me go until I injected a redundant trans narrative into the story, so here we go...
> 
> Just a disclaimer, this is going to start with some canon rehashing. Also... well, I'm just a transsexual in 'murica, so I have zero knowledge of the setting (Japan) beyond what's shown in this (presumably unrealistic) manga. So there may very well be inaccuracies.

_“Are you sure we should be doing this?”_

 

_Somehow, in this hidden place by the seashore, through a cavernous unseen tunnel and cloistered between towering cliffs, Megumi felt like she was the absolute smallest thing in the world. The gently roaring waves of the ocean seemed to push and pull upon the shore, like the frozen breath of some unseen giant, and even her new friend - who she’d met down by the entrance to this secret place - was taller than her._

 

_But still. He looked at her like she was no smaller than he was, like she was the most important thing in the world._

 

_“Don’t worry.” He said with a brilliant smile, taking her hand in his and leading her along to all the places that she’d always wanted to see but had been too scared to travel to alone. Together they stepped over the gut-wrenching gulfs between tidepools, reducing seemingly-impassable terrain to well-traveled trails. No less wondrous, still every bit as naively awe-inspiring and incredible to the eyes of the child that she was._

 

 _The soft sound of a_ splash _got her attention, drawing her eyes back to one off the pools, where her left sandal had fallen off and landed next to a wriggling almost-opalescent sea anemone._

 

_“Oops.” She whispered, the scorching caress of embarrassment creeping across her face. Her new friend looked back too, and his smile didn’t waver._

 

_“You can borrow one of mine.” He said, and his hand squeezed hers as if to be reassuring._

 

_“Eh?” She asked. If she were older and more self-aware, she might have retorted by pointing out that they had slightly different sized feet, or by pointing out that littering and leaving a perfectly good sandal behind was wrong. Instead she just tried to shake her head and leaned down to pull the sandal out of the water._

 

_“No, really, don’t.” He said. “You could get stung, and there are dangerous anemones out here. My older brother got stung once.”_

 

_She found her blush intensifying at her words, and he lifted a foot up to take off one of his own sandals._

 

_“Come on, take it!”_

 

_And so she did. It was nice that he cared, in some way that she didn’t dare to name._

 

_Together, the two of them stood on a rocky outcropping, between the shallow pools teeming with creatures from deeper places, between the soft sands and the harsh stone bluffs. Nestled in that nook of the shore, looking up at the blindingly white sky and out at the slate-blue ocean, you could almost believe that you were seeing the whole of the world._

 

_“What’s your name?” She asked the boy, grasping for something to remember him by, something to remember him and the beauty mark under his left eye and his lovely black hair, something to remember the mere way that he looked at her._

 

_“I’m Hikaru.” He said simply, looking around for some new frontier to explore. She had to look away from him to say what she wanted to say, because she couldn’t bare to look at him in case he rejected her next words._

 

_“I’m Megumi.” She whispered._

 

_“Megumi, huh?” He asked. “I’ll call you Megu-chan!”_

 

_“No, don’t.” She replied. “That’s… kind of embarrassing.”_

 

_Although maybe she liked it anyways._

 

_“Then just Megu.” Hikaru amended. Even though the clouds were out and all-obscuring, Megumi could swear that she saw the sun reflected in Hikaru’s eyes._

 

_Then he leaned in, and-_

 

===

 

And the alarm clock went off, startling Megumi into screaming wakefulness.

 

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

 

===

 

It was the first day of high school, and even as sleep deprived as she was, it was all Megumi could do not to jump for joy.

 

Normally, there was a sort of malediction or unpleasantness to a _first_ . The first day of the school week, monday, was vile. The first period of an unpleasant school day was worse. The first chore of the day made her shiver in dread for the workload ahead of her. The banality of a _first_ in a long line was almost evil - not in the sense of the ‘banality of evil’ where evil succeeds through the actions of the important, but in a different sense, where the sheer unremarkable slog of a first challenge among many was morally ugly.

 

Or something like that. Megumi was too busy looking ahead in her blind optimism to think about the awkwardness of making new friends, too busy looking ahead to think about the burden of schoolwork. Because this was a new year, a new page in her life!

 

Grade school, for her, had been… well, she barely remembered any of it aside from her brief crush and infatuation on the boy she knew as Hikaru. But that alone cast a shadow over those years - grade school was remembered as a time of passion for her. And then middle school had been years of nostalgia and melancholy over broken shortsighted dreams, because Hikaru had up and disappeared and she couldn’t learn to let go.

 

But now, well… those days were over.

 

Megumi was a high schooler. Her life wasn’t going to be shaped by a schoolgirl crush, not anymore.

 

No, she would find real love this time. And yeah, maybe she was still a schoolgirl, so any love she found would be a schoolgirl crush, but that was nitpicking. She was over Hikaru. Really and truly.

 

The weird dreams about Hikaru didn’t mean anything. Really and truly.

 

At least, that was what she told herself, as she struck poses in front of the mirror, trying to take her own measure. She would attract lots of boys, wouldn’t?

 

“Hey Megumi! Erika is here!”

 

For the second time in an hour, the second time since the alarm clock had torn her into the waking world, Megumi let out a scream of fright.

 

“Ah… hey sis… you… didn’t see that, did you?”

 

“Yes, Megumi.” Her sister confirmed. “I saw _everything_. Now get going before you’re late.”

 

And just like that, Megumi was hustled out of the door by her little sibling, who wore a shit-eating grin all the while.

 

===

 

“Did something happen, Megumi?”

 

Erika’s tone was conciliatory as she watched her friend emerge from the house, her face burning with shame.

 

“Nothing.” Megumi muttered. “Just my sister being a jerk again.”

 

“Oh, so that’s why you were so slow getting ready?” Erika snarked.

 

Megumi rammed Erika in the shoulder, hard, even as they walked to the bus stop.

 

“Hey, I was just kidding, you know.”

 

The falling cherry blossoms all around were like drops of pink against the cityscape, bleeding specks of beauty looking like broken rose quartz and like drops of some fey rain. You might try to breathe their scent in, to hunt it out, but it was oh-so-elusive in the bitter morning cold.

 

“Yeah, I know.” Megumi replied. “I’m just a bit antsy. Didn’t get enough sleep last night.”

 

“Well don’t doze off, now.” Erika laughed. “Today’s the first day of school, and you know that our teachers are already going to be looking for problem children.”

 

“Erika!” Megumi sputtered, scandalized beyond belief. “I am not a _problem child!_ ”

 

“That’s what all the problem children say.” Erika winked.

 

The bus which was taking them to campus crawled up to them, opening up to disgorge a horde of faces in the crowd and invite reprisal, and so Megumi and Erika entered the cramped cabin.

 

“Hey, did you do the summer homework, at least?” Erica continued. “Come on, give me something to talk about here. I missed you!”

 

“It’s been a week since I saw you last.” Megumi replied, finding herself fed-up and amused in equal measure.

 

“And I missed you… for a week.”

 

“Yeah yeah…” Megumi griped. “I was busy doing the homework at the last moment. How did you deal with the history research project?”

 

“Oh, for Nozomu?” Erika asked. “I just… hey, Megu!”

 

“Whuzzat?” Megumi asked. Somehow, everything seemed so diluted and distant.

 

“You’re sleeping again.”

 

“Oh.”

 

And somehow, that didn’t seem so important anymore.

 

“Come on, you gotta get up!”

 

“I’m sorry.” Megumi groaned. “I just… tried to wake up early this morning. Didn’t… didn’t go very well.”

 

“I’ll say.” Erika replied. “You’re getting embarrassing, you know?”

 

“Sorry…”

 

“Heh, it’s fine.”

 

And this time, Erika was the one to shoulder-slam Megumi.

 

“Wakey wakey. Come on, we’re almost there.”

 

The bus slowly came to a stop, vomiting up the passengers and allowing Erika to drag Megumi to her feet, where inertia alone was enough to keep her awake.

 

And slowly, they filed out of the bus with all the speed of molasses as they emptied onto the campus. All the old friends Megumi had known from previous school years were waiting for them there, a motley crew of friends of convenience.

 

“Hey guys.” She cried, receiving a litany of ‘good morning’s in return.

 

Miki strolled over, nearly falling over her own gangly (she would say _shapely_ ) legs and inviting a smile from Megumi.

 

“You got taller again, didn’t you?”

 

“You know it.” Miki supplied. On the other hand, Erika was already ribbing on short Chiaki ( _"_ _You_ didn’t grow at all, you just shrank!”), eliciting a rude gesture in return.

 

Behind them all, yet more people were getting off of the bus. Most of them did nothing to draw Megumi’s attention, and she liked that. In the sea of new names and faces, it would be easy for her to start again, to find someone new to love and someone to to be in love with. Easy to find a new fixation.

 

Then another girl walked out of the bus.

 

And if faces in the crowd were as petals upon a black bough, as the old poem went, then this new girl _was_ the black bough, her face and framed by the jet of her hair.

 

 _Wow, she’s gorgeous_.

 

Megumi blushed and turned away, rejecting that half-formed and instinctive first thought and dredging up a rationalization. _I hope I don’t end up in her class; there’s no way I can compete with_ that _._

 

Ahead of her, Erika was tapping her on the shoulder. “Come on, let’s go Megu.”

 

Megumi nodded and started following her friend along, adjusting the strap of her shoulder bag and ignoring the brief gasp of surprise from behind her.

 

“Megu-chan?”

 

That was significantly harder to ignore, though, and Megumi turned back again, facing the black-haired girl.

 

“Y… you mean me?”

 

The black-haired girl was staring at Megumi, looking simultaneously stupefied and vulnerable.

 

_Why… why is she staring at me? And… and… why is she still so cute!?_

 

_Oh god I didn’t just think that._

 

The black-haired girl broke out of her reverie, slowly approaching Megumi with a smile creeping across her face.

 

_Oh no, stranger danger stranger danger!_

 

_And she’s still cute! No!_

 

Megumi’s fears of being disemboweled by the girl evaporated on the spot, as… the black-haired girl… hugged her.

 

 _What_.

 

Rapidly, Megumi was already searching out new theories - was this murder by suffocation, as the hug grew tighter and tighter? - but then, the black-haired girl seemed to have had her fill, pulling away to gaze at Megumi with honest _affection_.

 

“It’s been forever, Megu-chan!”

 

_What!?_

 

===

 

It was inconceivable, yet also incontrovertible.

 

“My name is Hikaru Aihara.” The black-haired girl announced to Megumi’s homeroom during introductions. “And I’m a girl!”

 

She seemed to take special satisfaction in her declarations, drawing confusion from most of the class - although the boys still agreed that her bizarre behavior didn’t detract from her attractiveness, like the lechers that they were.

 

(Megumi would also admit that Hikaru was attractive, but that didn’t make her a lecher. Really and truly.)

 

It was _impossible_ that Hikaru was a girl, wasn’t it? But this girl, this Hikaru, had all the things that Hikaru did, down to the black hair and beauty mark.

 

“So how did you too know each other?” Erika and Chiaki asked, assuming a gossiping tone. “That was _quite_ the hug.”

 

_Uh…_

 

“In grade school.” Megumi said, reaching for the answer. “We… we…”

 

“Oh, you went to school together?” Miki assumed. Megumi just shook her head.

 

“No, that’s not… exactly it.” Megumi tried to explain, but it all seemed so strange now. How could she tell her friends about Hikaru if _she_ barely felt like she knew Hikaru?

 

“We played together once,” Hikaru explained. “On Kotogahama beach, out where Megumi’s grandmother lives.” She shrugged. “We only spent a day or so together, but I was so surprised to meet someone here that I already knew that I just _had_ to give Megumi a hug.”

 

Already, she was getting slightly _too_ intimate in the way that she was leaning against Megumi, but Megumi tried to ignore it. It was just in her imagination, the look in Hikaru’s eyes that made her uncomfortable… and maybe it wasn’t that bad anyways.

 

But still. “You’re getting a bit too close.” Megumi whispered.

 

 _She… knew that she was a girl all along,_ obviously _, and she must have known that I was a girl all along, right?_

 

_So… what… was everything that happened between us when we were on that beach? Was it her idea of some kind of twisted joke?_

 

The poisonous thoughts continued to circle through her mind like barbed wire swirling down a drain, taunting her and eroding the emotions she’d poured into her own memories - because how could she have fallen so hopelessly for the mere idea of a boy who had never been a boy at all, a boy who probably hadn’t cared for her to begin with?

 

They continued taunting her even as the hours ticked away and the school day ended, even as Hikaru continued fawning over her, even as they sat together at the back of the bus.

 

===

 

“So when did you come here, anyways?” Megumi asked. Hikaru shrugged.

 

“Late middle school.” She replied easily, raising an eyebrow at Megumi’s frown. “What? It’s true.”

 

“It’s nothing.” Megumi responded. “It’s just… I don’t know, you’re going to kill me. Metaphorically speaking. You’ve changed so much, Aihara.”

 

“Oh.” Hikaru said, gaining that same strangely-vulnerable look again. “You… you can call me Hikaru, you know.”

 

Megumi nodded, looking out the window at the city which was flowing by. “This whole time… I always thought that you were a boy, you know.”

 

Something in Hikaru’s strange, jaded vulnerability seemed to melt away. “Oh, yeah. Well, I was… you could call me a tomboy, I suppose.”

 

Megumi snorted.

 

“That summer…” Hikaru continued. “I guess I was _trying_ to be a boy. I don’t know.”

 

A beat of silence went between them as their bus went through a tunnel.

 

“Wait…” Megumi wondered. “Wait just a moment. Maybe you’re just a crossdresser or transsexual or something! Maybe?”

 

Hikaru looked truly _angry_ for a split-second, angry at being torn up and hurt by some grief, but then it passed. “No. I’m afraid not. I… I _am_ a girl.”

 

If she was trying to convince herself as much as she was trying to convince Megumi, then Megumi didn’t notice.

 

“Ugh, it’s just so hard to believe.” Megumi continued. “Not hard to believe that you’re a girl, I mean! Just hard to believe that I was wrong. Heh.”

 

“Well…” Hikaru offered. “I mean, you saw me in the locker room during gym, right?”

 

“No, of course not!” Megumi cried. “I… I don’t look at other girls in the locker room! I wouldn’t do that!”

 

The fact that Hikaru _had_ looked quite feminine (and maybe even attractive, heaven forbid) as she was, dressed down to her bra and underwear and putting her normal clothes back on was something that Megumi stoically didn’t think about.

 

“Oh.” Hikaru said. “Well, you can look now-”

 

She reached down to grab her skirt and lift it up, taking refuge in ultimate audacity-

 

“HIKARU! STOP THAT!”

 

Megumi hastily grabbed Hikaru’s hand, forcing both it and the skirt down.

 

“You… you shouldn’t do that! Don’t you have any modesty!?”

 

In truth, Megumi’s objection probably had nothing to do with modesty, and she was just looking for a way to stop the outlandish escalation of events. Just searching for a pretext as to why she _shouldn’t_ be looking up Hikaru’s skirt.

 

And Hikaru cocked her head. “Would you rather I was a boy, Megumi?”

 

“N-no, that’s not what I’m saying!” Megumi sputtered. “I just… I mean, I can’t do anything with a girl! Because I’m a girl too!”

 

Now, Hikaru laughed, and it struck Megumi sharply just how bitter and sad that laugh seemed. “I guess not. But you know, Megumi?”

 

“Mmm?”

 

“I really _am_ glad that I got to see you again.”

 

“Yeah.” Megumi said.

 

The bus was rapidly approaching it’s stop, prompting Megumi to begin rummaging through her bag. “Wait, hold on. Let’s swap cell phone numbers?”

 

“I don’t have a cell phone, Megu-chan.”

 

“Whaaat? Well, let me give you my e-mail address and then you can send me a text-”

 

“That’s impossible.”

 

“You’re joking! You really don’t have a cell phone? That’s just not right, Hikaru. I’ll have to help you fix that, sometime soon.”

 

“If you say so, Megu.” Hikaru said, smiling but not condescendingly so.

 

“And come on, I have a cell phone at least! Let me just… pull up the camera… and then we can take a picture to celebrate our reunion! Say cheese!”

 

Hikaru leaned into the camera frame obligingly, giving her best smile (albeit a muted one).

 

“And you know, Hikaru? I’m glad to see you too.”

 

===

 

It was hours later before Megumi realized that she’d set the picture as the background on her phone without thinking about it.

 

Staring at the photo, at Hikaru, it was hard to believe that Hikaru was anything _other_ than a girl. A superficial evaluation, perhaps, but it was obviously a true one in Megumi’s book.

 

_She really is gorgeous._

 

It had been almost four years since she had become so infatuated with Hikaru, under the delusion that Hikaru was a boy instead of a tomboy who looked like a boy. But Hikaru had obviously _always_ been a girl, hadn’t she?

 

_Hadn’t she?_

 

No, Megumi was done letting the memory of Hikaru-the-boy jerk her around through life. Because Hikaru was a girl, and Megumi couldn’t be with a girl. That was just _obvious_ , like so many other things in life that didn’t need questioning (even though perhaps things would be better if they _were_ questioned).

 

With those vaguely reassuring, vaguely menacing thoughts explaining everything away, Megumi let her head hit the pillow of her bed.

 

She could finally say goodbye to the idea of a Hikaru that she could love. She could give up on that, and find someone else.

 

===

 

_“Megumi, huh?” Hikaru asked, his words disrupting the sound of the waves breaking up against the rocks. “I’ll call you Megu-chan!”_

 

_“No, don’t.” Megumi replied, breathing the sharp cold and the softer smell of the seafoam. “That’s… kind of embarrassing.”_

 

_Although maybe she liked it anyways._

 

_“Then just Megu.” Hikaru amended. Although, even despite the nickname change, she could hear it in his voice: he cared all the same._


	2. Chapter 2

It had only been a few days since Hikaru had arrived - since _everyone_ had arrived at school - and Hikaru had already become _stupidly_ , overwhelmingly, _mind-blowingly_ popular. Something about that girl - a lot of things about that girl - were just primed to set up the perfect storm of temptation and pique and fascination.

 

_“-man, did you see her run? Those fucking legs-”_

 

Just as good in sports as all the girls and more than half of the boys? Check.

 

_“-smart AND sexy AND funny-”_

 

Perfect grades? Check. Sociable in all the likeable ways? Check.

 

 _“-you’re_ joking _, right? You have the hots for her? If she doesn’t have a dark secret and a mysterious past, then I’ll eat my pants. Never stick your dick in-”_

 

Enigmatic and reserved in all the intriguing ways? Check.

 

_“-nah, man, I’ve already got a girlfriend. Still, what she doesn’t know-”_

 

And of course, was she physically beautiful? Double - no, triple - triple check that. With a cherry on top.

 

And all of that taken in consideration? Well, sometimes Megumi _really_ wanted to punch someone.

 

Right now? She wanted to punch a lot of people. She wanted to punch the people who loitered around, ogling Hikaru. Not because she was jealous of anything or anyone - it was the principle of the thing, obviously. She wanted to punch the people who loitered around, ogling Hikaru _and_ _putting Hikaru down at the same time_ the most of all. The sheer presumption of the thing made her dizzy.

 

But Hikaru didn’t even seem to care.

 

Sometimes, Megumi sort of wanted to just break down in front of Hikaru, break down and ask how she did it - how did she handle the attention? And that was probably a sign of how introverted Megumi could be sometimes, but she couldn’t imagine coping with all of that. With the burden of being perfect (perfect in the eyes of others, at any rate), and the burden of the attention that would inevitably bring down on her head.

 

But she didn’t, because Hikaru was fine, and there was nothing to be sad about. Right?

 

( _And what kind of environment did she grow up in, to be fine with it?_ )

 

“Hey? Megu, you okay?”

 

Megumi pulled the lollipop she was sucking on out of her mouth, contemplating it silently. It _was_ just an unpalatable blue raspberry sucker, but she never had enjoyed much self control.

 

So instead she put it between her teeth, and bit down hard until it shattered away from the lollipop stick.

 

“I’m fine, Hikaru.” She said, flicking the stick into the trash. “Just a bit distracted. Are you ready to go?”

 

“Yup!” Hikaru chirped. “Is Erika coming with us to the mall?”

 

“Nah.” Megumi sighed. “She told me that something came up for her.”

 

Hikaru shrugged, hoisting her shoulder bag over her… shoulder. Like it was designed for.

 

Not that Megumi was paying attention to Hikaru’s shoulders. Obviously.

 

“Anyways, let’s go.”

 

===

 

The electronics store was a surprisingly wonderful place, at least as far as Megumi was concerned. There was more than just the higher-order items to look out for, like phones and mp3 players and gadgets - it was the little stuff which caught her eye, wires and transistors and circuits. Not for what they did, but for what they _could_ do. They caught her eye for their implications.

 

When Megumi had left her grandmother that one summer so long ago, she’d been engulfed with a diffuse and unquenchable wanderlust, a yearning for _exploration_. A yearning for the feeling of of uncovery, of unraveling the unknowable - the unknowable which had seemed so much more infinite back then. But she was just a little kid stuck at home, sitting listlessly in her room when she wasn’t heartsick for the tomboy that she had tricked herself into thinking was a boy.

 

So her father had given her a number of his old textbooks, all the ones that he thought would be interesting to her. She read them all and more, going beyond the merely ‘engaging’ tomes and searching for the encrypted and oh-so-impenetrable doorstoppers which she couldn’t ignore, rooting out tales of Graham’s Number and topology and Ramanujan and chemistry and Maxwell and Feynman. It was all in the spirit of _exploration_ , of course.

 

And she wasn’t an expert, she never would be - she didn’t have the _backbone_ and _perseverance_ for that, and never would have it - but she had been touched in the head by her layman’s understanding of those entrancing abstractions. Now, she looked at the electrical components and she saw possibilities. She saw a platonic space or set of permutations of components which she could _explore_ , hunting for the most interesting combinations of components.

 

Her diffuse and unquenchable wanderlust had never ceased. And sometimes that left her head just up in the clouds.

 

Like now, for example.

 

“This _cannot_ be a phone.” Hikaru declared surely. Megumi shook her head, clearing the foggy wall of her own daydream.

 

“What’s that, Hikaru?”

 

“This isn’t a phone!” Hikaru maintained. “Not! A! Phone! There aren’t even any buttons!”

 

Megumi put a hand over her mouth, hiding her grin. “It’s a touchscreen.”

 

“On a phone!? I thought that touchscreens were just for ATMs!”

 

“Yup, it’s a phone touchscreen.” Megumi confirmed. “I’m sorry, I forgot that you hadn’t used a phone before.”

 

Hikaru blushed. “I had a phone once… in middle school… for a few months.”

 

Megumi put the smartphone back on the shelf, noting the unruly price. “Why’d you give it up? Harassment?”

 

Hikaru choked on her own lollipop, apple flavored and nearly poisonous green in color.

 

“Wha-” She rasped, hocking up the hard candy. “What? Harassed? Me? Why would _I_ be harassed? I’m normal!”

 

“Um.” Megumi said. “You have a cult following back at school. You get creepy love notes in the middle of almost every break.”

 

Hikaru seemed to wilt from sheer relief. “Oh, that. No, that’s not harassment. And besides, if I was getting harassed back in middle school - _and I’m not saying that I was!_ \- I would have just changed my phone number.”

 

 _Not harassment my ass_. Megumi thought to herself, but bit her tongue.

 

“Then… if you don’t mind me asking, why _did_ you lose the cell phone?”

 

“Because I’ve always been a bit of a luddite.” Hikaru deadpanned. “Cell phones just seemed like a pain in the ass.”

 

And didn’t _that_ just make Megumi feel like a total heel?

 

“Well you don’t have to buy one just because I want you too…” Megumi muttered.

 

Hikaru smiled again. “Hey, that was then, and this is now. And besides, I’d totally deal with a pain in the ass for you, Megu-chan.”

 

Something in Megumi’s chest lurched uncomfortably. Or perhaps that was the wrong way to phrase it entirely - and the thing that was lurching was quite warm and reassuring.

 

“I want to be able to text you, you know? Come on, give me that cell phone. And give me your email and cell phone number, too.”

 

“Eh?” Megumi stuttered, put on the spot. “Oh, alright, but don’t read too much into it. It’s an embarrassing email.”

 

If Hikaru agreed that it was embarrassing - and she probably did, because _MeguMiracle_ was hardly a serious screen name - she didn’t make a big deal out of it beyond a knowing smile.

 

Together, the two of them trailed out of the electronics store, Megumi giving transistors and resistors longing looks all the while, when they ran into a pair that they weren’t expecting at all.

 

“Is that Erika?” Hikaru wondered absently.

 

“Yeah. Her and her boyfriend.”

 

“Her boyfriend?” Hikaru cried out with surprise. “But… he looks like he’s thirty!”

 

“Yeah, he’s 26 or so. He used to be her history tutor. Then they hooked up.”

 

Hikaru blinked the surprise out of her eyes. “Oh man, that is so wrong.”

 

“I know, right?”

 

===

 

“Hey, Erika-chan, is that your friend?”

 

“Huh?” Erika murmured, looking over at her boyfriend and then over at Megumi and Hikaru. “Yeah, that’s her. Her and her new ‘best friend.’”

 

Her boyfriend chuckled, watching the flitter of emotions which crossed between the unlikely pair on the other side of the mall. Then, he hissed out in a stage whisper.

 

“They’re totally gay, aren’t they?”

 

“Yuuup.”

 

“That is _so wrong!_ ”

 

“I know, right?”

 

===

 

“I guess it could be worse, though.” Megumi mused. “I mean, she seems happy…”

 

“You think she’s faking her happiness?” Hikaru asked, frowning slightly. “Why would she do that?”

 

“I don’t know.” Megumi muttered. “I just can’t imagine that anyone would want a boyfriend so badly that they would settle for some old pervert. I still barely understand her choice, there.”

 

“Maybe she’s not settling.” Hikaru pointed out. “Maybe she likes them old.”

 

“Maybe.” Megumi granted, doing everything in her power not to sound like she was considering it too deeply. “But enough gossip behind their backs. How about you? Do you have a secret older boyfriend?”

 

“Nope.” Hikaru replied. “Never had a boyfriend.”

 

“...you’re joking.” Megumi said faintly. “Never?”

 

“Never.”

 

“But…” Megumi said, searching for the objection which would adequately capture her dismay. “You could have your pick of boys.”

 

“I know.” Hikaru said softly. “I know.”

 

An awkward silence stretched between them before Hikaru coughed. “I… well what about you? Do you have a boyfriend?”

 

“Well…” Megumi trailed off, twiddling her fingers. “I’m not any better than you, I suppose. Never had a boyfriend either.”

 

Somehow, the floodgates of her emotions began opening up of their own volition, and then the words wouldn’t stop coming. “I’ve had boys approach me before, but I always turned them away. I guess I was always really serious about trying to find ‘Hikaru-kun’ and having a relationship with him. He was my first love.”

 

Hikaru seemed quite intent on examining her nails, all of a sudden.

 

“I must have been a really obtuse kid, you know. I never realized that you were a girl all along.”

 

Hikaru dropped her hand, looking at Megumi like Megumi had grown a second head. Hikaru looked at Megumi like Hikaru was a parent watching a child grapple with their own ignorance. Hikaru looked at Megumi like Hikaru was a con-man who felt guilty as sin and Megumi was her mark.

 

“Sometimes I don’t know what to do with you, Megumi.” Hikaru said, looking at Megumi like Megumi was no bigger or smaller than Hikaru was, like Megumi was the most important thing in the world.

 

“What? What’s that supposed to mean!?”

 

“Nothing at all.”

 

“You’re making fun of me, aren’t you!” Megumi blustered.

 

“Not at all.” Hikaru returned, laughing bitterly and oh-so-sadly at all the things she left unsaid. “If anything, I’m making fun of myself.”

 

As the two of them left the mall, waiting for the bus, Megumi entertained thoughts of just walking all the way home. Perhaps taking a detour to find some new secret of the city she called home, turning the ambiguous and unknown into the merely real. But she didn’t, because beyond a certain point, mystery was best left as a mystery. Some things seemed better off unsaid.

 

She wanted to explore, she really and truly did, more than anything else. But not _too_ far - lest, as she often irrationally feared, she somehow accidentally destroyed the wonder of the world that she lived in. She thrived on sculpting ambiguity into meaning, because if she learned everything that she _could_ reasonably learn, all that would be left to do for her would be for her to choose what to do about it all.

 

Some things seemed better left unsaid.

 

“Mmm, Megumi.” Hikaru asked hesitantly. “Do you want to do anything else fun before we go home?”

 

And Megumi smiled. “I think I’d like that.”

 

===

 

By the time that Megumi got to school the next day, she’d missed two of her classes. The price she paid for a late night out on the town, extorted by the iron grip of sleep.

 

“You’re late, Megumi!”

 

To Megumi’s dismay, it wasn’t Hikaru who came to greet her as she ran into class, but Erika. When Megumi had started dropping her old friend by the wayside, she wasn’t sure, but her reaction burst out anyways.

 

“Do any of you know where Hikaru is?”

 

“Hikaru?” Erika mused. “No, that’s what we were wondering about. Last I saw she was in a shouting match with some of the third years.”

 

Megumi’s blood ran colder and more ancient than ice.

 

“What, she was fighting? I knew that some of the boys were getting... forward… but... “

 

Erika rolled her eyes. “Not the boys, the _girls_. Obviously.”

 

“What.”

 

“Yeah.” Erika confirmed. “They thought that Hikaru was going to seduce their boyfriends or something _completely stupid_ like that. God, if they even knew about you two-”

 

If Megumi was paying more attention, she might have gotten irritated at the implied allegation that she was gay - because that was _OBVIOUSLY UNTRUE_. Obviously. But she wasn’t paying attention, because she was too busy worrying about Hikaru.

 

“-then they would… well, they would probably find a different pretext for bullying her, actually. But that’s not the point. And… hey, Megumi, where are you going? You’re going to miss third period, too!”

 

Megumi was already gone, leaving Erika to scowl and stamp her feet.

 

“Fucking useless lesbian.”

 

===

 

Hikaru looked like she would kill anything under the baleful glare of her eyes, brewing some dark vengeance for anyone who dared to cross her.

 

Then she saw Megumi, and all the spite in her eyes slowly bled away through the creases and lines of her face, into her frame and the shell of her body.

 

“H… hey Megumi. I didn’t know you’d gotten here.”

 

“I just arrived.” Megumi panted. The two of them together sat atop the school roof, alone and secluded from the world. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I was so worried, are you okay!?”

 

“Of course.” Hikaru lied. “I’m fine.”

 

The school bell rang out from below, and Megumi seemed like she’d been slapped by a fish for several seconds.

 

“Aaagh… I’m gonna get in so much trouble with my parents.”

 

Hikaru shrugged. “We’re already late. Want to just skip this class?”

 

Again, Megumi wanted to flounder in place. But Hikaru extended her hand, leading her over to the tippy-top of a raised section of the roof. Compared to the masterworks of man, it might as well have been a throne for a peasant - not very high up at all, compared to the skyscrapers which impaled the heavens of far off cities. But in the sleepy suburbs where they lived, they could look up at the sky and out at the distant dismal ocean and over the grainy buildings below and feel like they were grasping the whole of the world.

 

“I actually feel bad for anyone in class.” Megumi said, running her hands through the curving winds.

 

“Mmm.” Hikaru agreed.

 

The sky began to cloud over, darkening to a mottled blotched patchwork.

 

“You know.” Megumi said probingly. “I heard that you’ve been having troubles with a lot of the other girls and boys in school.”

 

“Maybe.” Hikaru replied, ever unwilling to leave things ambiguous. But this wasn’t an issue that seemed better off unsaid.

 

“Please, Hikaru.” Megumi begged, finding herself _crying_ of all things. She blinked, raising a hand to wipe the tear away, only to realize that it was running down the side of her cheek, far removed from her eye.

 

It was the beginnings of a potential rain, not tears.

 

“You… I… We’re friends, right? I want you to tell me if you’re having problems or hurting. I want you to know that I’m here for you. I care about you.”

 

The rivulets of salt water along Hikaru’s face had nothing to do with the rain.

 

“I don’t have any right to complain…” She slurred out through the tightness in her throat. “It’s what I wished for, isn’t it?”

 

“What?” Megumi squeaked. “I don’t understand.”

 

“I was such a boy. Such a t-tomboy, I mean.” Hikaru continued. “I wanted to be a beautiful girly-girl, you know? And I should have realized what I was getting into. Stupid. Stupid of me. Stupid to even _want_ to begin with.”

 

“Hey.” Megumi said gently. Really, she had no idea _what_ to do - she was so out of her depth that it wasn’t even funny. But like with a lot of things, she faked it until she would make it. “It’s not your fault, yeah? You didn’t do anything wrong. The grass is always greener, and all that. And, uh, how does the story go… you can’t blame yourself for wishing on a monkey’s paw?”

 

Hikaru’s crying only seemed to intensify.

 

“Oh, no, I’m not helping, am I? Dang it. Hey, hey, Hikaru-”

 

“I’m so bad at this.” Hikaru hiccupped. “Can’t even be a girl properly.”

 

“Hikaru, please, listen to me-”

 

“I’m so sorry.” Hikaru whimpered.

 

Megumi shuffled over awkwardly, trying to be much more sure of herself than she really felt. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I promise.”

 

Hikaru looked up, and Megumi actually wanted to cry herself at the half-formed grief in the black-haired girl’s eyes, the desperation for exoneration and validation and affection.

 

They forgot about time entirely, looking at each other.

 

===

 

_Even though the clouds were out and all-obscuring, Megumi could swear that she saw the sun reflected in Hikaru’s eyes._

 

_Then he leaned in, and kissed her with the taste of the ocean.  
_

 

===

 

And Hikaru’s lips were just as soft and sweet and enthralling as they always had been, exactly as wonderful as Megumi remembered through her rose-tinted glasses.

 

It should have been a beautiful kiss, and it might have been, if Megumi wasn’t so completely _surprised_ and shocked and if Hikaru didn’t hate herself for even wanting it to begin with.

 

“H-Hikaru?” Megumi squeaked out as she gasped for breath. The girl in question looked completely defeated.

 

“I… forget it.” She said hollowly. “I… damn, I guess I must be more bent out of shape than I thought. I can’t even remember what kind of jokes are appropriate. Sorry, sorry, I was just… messing around. Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

 

The excuse was thinner than paper and more transparent than glass, and both of them knew it.

 

“I… I have to get to class.” Hikaru lied. “I’m sorry. So sorry I don’t even know how to say it.”

 

And then Megumi was alone to wonder how the hell she even felt and what the hell she was going to do about it.

 

That was all there was.

 

“I’m sorry.”


	3. Chapter 3

_"-who the hell does he think he is-"_

 

_"-you fucking faggot, are you trying to come onto me-?"_

 

_"-oh, just can it. You must think you're so special, pretending to be some heroine-"_

 

Unlike Megumi, Hikaru didn't dream of love.

 

===

 

And, if she was being totally honest with herself, it wasn’t supposed to be this way.

 

Wasn’t supposed to _go_ this way.

 

Hikaru had fled the oceanside to escape the vapid shallows of society, where petty creatures were kings and queens and everything was so superficial and cutting. She had thought she would get away from it all.

 

But awful people were everywhere, by the side of the ocean and by the side of the city. It was all the same.

 

If the small-minded had called her words such as ‘faggot’ before, now they called her ‘slut’ or any other invective they could find. Their mean hearts had remained the same - it was only the words and myriad tools of spite which changed.

 

 _“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, girl?”_ The small-minded asked. _“He’s_ mine _. Not yours. Are you_ trying _to steal him from me? I see the way he looks at you_. _”_

 

It should have been funny, the way that the paranoid girls at school conspired amongst themselves to find an excuse for their failed love lives. How, as boys flocked to Hikaru, the other girls blamed Hikaru for it all - some twisted crab bucket mentality.

 

But it wasn’t funny. It was ridiculous, but it wasn’t hilarious. The vague, unprovable gossiping filled her ears with a dull roar and left her feeling as if she was drowning.

 

So much for escaping the shallows of society. So much for escaping the oceanside.

 

The other girls were so _stupid_ sometimes, as far as Hikaru was concerned. They seemed to think that if only they ended the competition, then they would _win_ in the great game of romance. But that was convoluted of them. Messy. Visceral.

 

Their foolishness made her want to scream. They pissed her off so much, because they played around with mind games instead of just being open with the objects of their affection.

 

 _But then,_ Hikaru thought, _it’s not like I’m any different, am I? Playing around with Megumi instead of being open._

 

It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

 

Hikaru wasn’t supposed to still be in love with a girl. How could she honestly say that she was a woman if she still clung to a crush she’d tendered when she was a boy?

 

Because she hadn’t always been a girl, hadn’t always thought of herself as a girl, hadn’t always thought of her younger self as a ‘tomboy.’ The truth of it all was that she had been a boy who wanted to be a girl, and now that she had scraped by into eating that forbidden fruit, into eating the lotus petal, she'd tricked her friends into remembering her as a boyish girl.

 

No, she was a liar. Megumi _had_ fallen in love with a boy, and Hikaru was lying to Megumi in asserting that she had always been a girl. Hikaru was lying to herself if she actually thought that she was anything more than a ghost of the boy in Megumi’s memory.

 

Megumi could never love a liar. And neither could Hikaru, so she didn’t dare to love herself.

 

It wasn’t supposed to _go_ this way. But it did.

 

===

 

“Moooom! Megu-moron is being weird again!”

 

Megumi did her best to ignore her younger sister’s name-calling, although it was hardly easy. Her sister _did_ have a knack for being an annoying little jerk, after all.

 

“Sweetie, Megumi is always weird. Don’t worry about it.”

 

“But there’s something I have to tell her!”

 

Megumi snorted, standing up and brushing past her sibling.

 

“If I’m always weird, then there’s _always_ something that you have to tell me, squirt.”

 

“I- hey!”

 

Personally, Megumi didn’t think she was that weird. Well, she _was_ weird, but she wasn’t _weird._ For lack of a better word. She was kind of dweeby, she had no clue who she was as a person or who she would become, and her social skills could be exceeded by a lemon rind. But she wasn’t weird in a bad way. She was outre, but not malign.

 

And of course, she was rationalizing, because she wasn’t confident enough to believe that she wasn’t weird and she didn’t want to feel hurt by her sister’s ribbing.

 

But that wasn’t the point!

 

The point was… right. The point was that she was too busy thinking about Hikaru to interact with her family. Poor social skills. That was why she was staring off into space and ignoring whatever her sister and mother might have to say.

 

That was why even as she sat in the shower, trying to get ready for bed, she was barely cleaning herself. Just dunking her head under the running hot water and thinking.

 

Thinking was actually really hard. She’d thought hard before, but that was always about things which really had no application to her everyday life, always about trivia and minutiae. Having to think about something when there was something at stake (her friendship with Hikaru, Hikaru’s feelings, even Megumi’s feelings) made thinking hard.

 

“Damn it.” She muttered. “I fucked up.”

 

She never should gone along with Hikaru and brushed the kiss aside. Because obviously they were going to _have_ to talk about it (weren’t they?) and now it would be even more awkward to deal with the issue.

 

How were you even supposed to ask your friend about her potential homosexual attraction for you? And who were you supposed to ask to figure out how you felt (how you were supposed to feel)?

 

There was no easy way to get the answer, which chafed, because almost all the answers Megumi had always searched for were always a trip to the library or internet search away.

 

“Damn it!”

 

Megumi actually heard her younger sister begin sputtering from outside the bathroom door, trying to open up a rant about poor language.

 

She just didn’t _know_. And how had she missed Hikaru’s feelings (whatever those feelings were) until Hikaru actually went and kissed her? How had she been such a poor friend that she couldn’t help Hikaru even as Hikaru cried her eyes out on the roof?

 

If Hikaru had gotten her cell phone set up, then Megumi would have gone and called. But Hikaru hadn’t, so Megumi couldn’t.

 

Megumi didn’t get sleep that night. Instead she was too tired to close her eyes, watching her own worst fears rattle around in her skull and listening to her own anxieties as they slithered from her own lips and crawled back in through her ears.


	4. Chapter 4

“Good morning.” Megumi groaned, dragging herself through the syrupy unreality of the early-morning after an all-nighter. Together with Erika, she was waiting at the bus stop for their transportation to arrive.

 

“You look like crap, Megumi.” Erika said bluntly.

 

“I guess I just had a lot on my mind…” Megumi shrugged, rather downtrodden. She wondered - had Hikaru had such an anxious time, tossing and turning over ideas and over possibilities?

 

“The bus is here, Megumi.”

 

Megumi followed Erika listlessly along onto the bus, fretting every step of the way.

 

“Oh, good morning.” Erika cried happily. Megumi looked up.

 

“Good morning!” Hikaru smiled from her seat on the bus, responding to Erika in kind.

 

She looked like nothing had ever happened the day before. Completely normal. Completely calm and composed, a far cry from her disturbed and sorrowful self.

 

And that took the nerve right out of Megumi’s bones. How was she supposed to talk to Hikaru? Just bring it up out of nowhere, despite the awkwardness of it all?

 

Didn’t Hikaru want to talk about what had happened?

 

Did _Megumi_ want to talk about what had happened? What was she actually going to say?

 

She… she did like Hikaru, didn’t she? But what did that actually mean going forward? Did she want to go _out_ with Hikaru?

 

That could never work, could it? No-one would ever let them live it down if they went out.

 

 _I notice_ , a sneaky voice spoke up from the back of her head, _that your objections are more about social backlash and less about what you actually want. You totally would want to go out with her, if you could._

 

 _Shut up_ , Megumi replied to herself irritably.

 

Why did figuring everything out have to be so hard? Why was it so hard for Megumi and Hikaru to just _forget_ about what they did in their youth, as they should have? Why was it so hard to pretend that the kiss on the beach and the kiss on the roof never happened?

 

Time slipped through her fingers like sand through the waves and the surf, until classes were over for the day and the field trip was over for the day ( _when was the field trip even arranged?_ Megumi wondered) and Megumi and Hikaru were lying together on the ground in thin (nearly nonexistent) sleeping bags.

 

“What am I going to do about you, Hikaru?” Megumi mumbled to herself. Off to her side, Hikaru stirred.

 

“What’s that, Megumi?”

 

Megumi could have put it all off, on the grounds that it was poor timing - but there never was a perfect time for anything.

 

So she bit the proverbial bullet, gripping it between her teeth and crushing it flat.

 

“So…” She searched for words as soon as the two of them were alone. “We kissed yesterday, didn’t we?”

 

In reality, it was mostly _Hikaru_ who had done the kissing, but Megumi had probably reciprocated. Either way, it was a ‘we kissed’ and not a ‘you kissed me’ because Megumi wanted to grasp for control of some kind.

 

“Can we talk about that?”

 

Hikaru shrugged, going slightly blank and reserved in the face. “I told you, Megumi, I was just messing around. Sorry if I upset you.”

 

“And I don’t buy that you were just messing around.” Megumi said gently.

 

Hikaru looked split in half, voiceless. So Megumi tried to ask the obvious question: _Did you want to kiss me? Did you like kissing me?_

 

Instead, something locked up in her head, producing the _worst_ possible opening question imaginable.

 

“Do you want to fuck me?”

 

Hikaru turned just about as purple as her own pajamas and sleeping bag.

 

“I mean, um, did you want to kiss me? Did you like fucking me - I mean, did you l-like kissing me? Gah!”

 

Hikaru looked like she was about to explode. Megumi didn’t feel much better.

 

_I can’t believe I just said that!_

 

“Uh, what I mean, is…” Megumi stuttered. “Do you like girls?”

 

 _Do you like_ me _in particular?_ Went unsaid.

 

All the awkwardness and levity went out the window like air from a punctured balloon.

 

“I guess… I guess I do.” Hikaru muttered, looking away. In truth, she couldn’t even bear to see Megumi’s judgements (the judgement that she was expecting, at any rate) in her eyes. “I know… I know it’s… I don’t even have the words. I can’t keep doing this, not anymore.”

 

“Hikaru-”

 

“I’m disgusting.” Hikaru continued decisively.

 

“No-”

 

“You don’t have to spare my feelings. And I get it if you don’t want to be around me anymore.” Hikaru concluded. She had wanted to say _I get it if you don’t want to be my friend anymore_ , but she could barely see the light at the end of the tunnel, let alone believe anyone was really her friend.

 

Because, in her mind, anyone who knew her only knew a facade.

 

“Hikaru.” Megumi said sharply, allowing no room for argument. “I’m not trying to sugarcoat anything. So I’ll ask you a question. Do you think that _I’m_ disgusting?”

 

Hikaru looked up, surprised again. “What? Of course not!”

 

“But I enjoyed the kiss.” Megumi confessed. “I like you, at least a little bit. Maybe a lot, maybe I like you more than I’m comfortable admitting, even to myself. If you’re disgusting for liking girls then I’m disgusting too.”

 

Hikaru shook her head. “No… no, it’s different for you. You’re-”

 

She cut herself off, looking away again. And Megumi _knew_ that obviously there was some dark secret on the tip of Hikaru’s tongue, but she couldn’t imagine it for the life of her.

 

Later, she would find her obliviousness laughable - but hindsight was always 20/20.

 

“Hikaru.” Megumi said sternly. “Why are you not allowed to like girls?”

 

“I don’t know.” Hikaru muttered, wiping tears away. “I…”

 

“Well,” Megumi continued, resting upon the laurels of her middle school debate club victories. “If anyone tells you that you’re not allowed to like girls then they’re wrong. Just like they’re wrong when they tell me that. We can be rule breakers together. Or something.”

 

Hikaru giggled, tears spilling over into laughter.

 

“And you really think it’s that simple?”

 

Megumi chewed on her lip, chewed on her words, weighing alternatives and judging her choices.

 

“No. I’m scared as hell. But even though it won’t be simple… well, I don’t see why that means it wouldn’t be worth it. And I like you, and you like me, and… er… well, I don’t see why we can’t make it work.”

 

Hikaru might have broken down and confessed her imagined sins right then and there, admitted that she was every bit the transsexual, disgusting, and unlovable pervert that she castigated herself for being every night - in the dark, alone with the water rushing through the pipes, and without anyone to shake the distortion of depression that clouded her thoughts.

 

But she didn’t. Because she was afraid. She didn’t have the courage to bite the bullet, so she put it off.

 

The pretext, the rationalization in Hikaru’s mind for not explaining herself was something of an ugly thing: if Megumi had loved her as a boy, and loved her as a girl, she told herself, then, why did she even have to admit that she’d actually gone and transitioned from one to another? This comedy of errors, with Megumi convinced that Hikaru had been a mere tomboy all along, was good enough.

 

Even though Megumi knew Hikaru as a facade and a lie of omission, Hikaru could still feel the warmth of Megumi’s affection through that facade.

 

And even if Megumi’s first instinct was to kiss Hikaru again - the influence of hormones, perhaps - she didn’t, because she could tell that Hikaru just really _really_ needed a damn hug.

 

And it was no kiss to move heaven and earth, but that hug? It was a damn fucking good hug.

 

===

 

And from there, everything was okay for Hikaru and Megumi. Okay enough, at any rate.

 

Together, the two of them quietly stole kisses away in the morning and in-between moments, when no-one was looking.

 

They showed their mutual affection with all the displays that couples used - feeding each other and touching each other and loving each other and hugging each other - and expected people not to notice, which was perhaps naive of them. But still, it was sweet.

 

And if there were problems in their relationship, well Megumi (at least) had a confidant in her teacher, who was a perpetually drunk pervert after hours. _“You just have to be honest and communicate.”_ She would mutter around a mouthful of alcohol. _“And if she does the same, then your relationship will be fine.”_

 

_“Really?”_

 

_“Really. But if you still need help, there are all kinds of neat things you can do with your tongue-”_

 

_“LA LA LA LA, I CAN’T HEAR YOU!”_

 

And Megumi didn’t doubt that if _she_ was honest, then Hikaru would be honest in return. Because Hikaru wasn’t a liar. Obviously.

 

So together, Hikaru and Megumi stayed up late into the night, simply luxuriating in each other’s presence while no-one could see and judge them, and slept all through the day, when the tides of sleep caught up to them.

 

Everything was okay. So Megumi found herself growing complacent, and - in the manner of a teenager who had yet to fully grasp and comprehend the consequences of her actions - decided to push a boundary.

 

Even though some things were better left unsaid.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The views expressed by characters herein do not necessarily reflect my own views.

In the late of the night, so late that it was early morning, the stars overhead seemed to scrape gently against the infinitely distant black-navy-slate sky. A beautiful, wondrous, majestic spattering of pinpricks of light against ink.

 

But for Hikaru, buried under Megumi’s form, the lights of Megumi’s eyes were infinitely more enthralling than even the majesty of far-off stars.

 

_ Even this too shall pass, _ she knew. But she would have savored the moment regardless, even without proverbial wisdom. It was too powerful, too heady a lotus tonic to pass up.

 

===

 

“Hey. Hey, Hikaru. Hikaru.”

 

School had let out early for break, leaving Megumi and Hikaru nearly alone on the bus which was taking them back home.

 

And Hikaru laughed, sounding happy - as opposed to sad and bitter - for the first time in ages. “What is it, Megumi?”

 

“I was thinking… I mean, it was nice being together on that field trip. Sleeping together. Er, platonically, I mean!”

 

Hikaru giggled.

 

”Ah, Hikaru! You’re so mean to me!” Megumi whined melodramatically.

 

“Well, I must admit that you do make it so hard to be mean to you.” Hikaru said consolingly, leaning in to touch the back of Megumi’s hand. Megumi smiled.

 

”Aw, thanks. Buuuut… wouldn’t it be cool if I could come over to your house over school break?”

 

“No way.” Hikaru replied easily. “Not gonna happen.”

 

Megumi faltered. “But why? It would be like a sleepover! And, yeah, we’re too old for sleepovers, but it would be fun!”

 

“Megumi…” Hikaru said softly, breathing in as if she was about to change her mind. “...no way, nope, nada, nein. I said it once before, and now I’ve said it five times. Leave it. Please.”

 

And so Megumi felt like she had to do something to break through the obvious clumsy weirdness of the issue, and she did so by letting go of all of her impulse control.

 

“Megumi, isn’t this your stop?” Hikaru said accusingly as they waited on the bus together.

 

“Nope. Of course not.”

 

Hikaru glared daggers at Megumi as the bus pulled away from Megumi’s house.

 

“But it  _ is _ your stop!”

 

“Is it?” Megumi wondered quietly. “Oh. Well then, I guess I’ll have to get off the bus at the next stop then. And walk home from there. It’s dangerous, I suppose - but it’s not like there’s anywhere else I can stay…”

 

“You utterly conniving, manipulative, lovable bitch.” Hikaru scowled. “Fine, you can stay at my place. Just until you can call your parents or something.”

 

Megumi rifled through her backpack. “Oh. But I don’t have my cell phone with me.”

 

“Yes you do.” Hikaru spat. “I see it right there.”

 

“But it’s out of battery power.” Megumi lied. “And hey, look at this. It seems that I still have my stuff packed from that field trip a few days ago. How fortuitous…”

 

“Megumi?” Hikaru growled. “You’re such an ass sometimes. You can’t stay over!”

 

“I know.” Megumi winked. “I know you think that I can’t stay over.”

 

“You really can’t stay over!”

 

“Whatever you say~” Megumi cooed.

 

===

 

It was idyllic; it was paradise; it was like a snippet cut out of the garden of eden and prettied up with the finest architecture money could buy. Perhaps even prettied up with architecture  _ finer _ than money could buy.

 

“Hikaru! Your house is fucking awesome!” Megumi laughed, trotting in through the front door. “I feel like I just married into wealth!”

 

Hikaru swooned, nearly falling to the floor and breaking something. “M-married!?”

 

“Yeah!” Megumi confirmed. “You know I’d totally marry you… well, some day, I mean. If we could.”

 

Hikaru was about as red as a tomato, turning away to avoid burning anything with the heat of her face.

 

The walls of Hikaru’s house were peppered with various sundry photos of childhood years; at first, Megumi thought that they were all photos of Hikaru, but a second glance confirmed the opposite; none of the young boyish children in the photos had the beauty mark that Hikaru had. In fact, Hikaru was nowhere to be seen in the archives and annals of the past.

 

“So…” Megumi wondered. “Who else is home right now?”

 

“Thankfully, nobody.” Hikaru grumbled. “Mother and father dearest are out on a business trip. My older brothers all moved out recently, and my youngest brother is out at some asinine after-school thing.”

 

“Are they really so intolerable?” Megumi asked, peeking down a hallway to take a look at a wonderful sculpted statue of a woman who  _ looked _ like Aphrodite, the Greek goddess.

 

“Not exactly.” Hikaru responded. “They’re good people, most of the time. Just… very interpersonally clumsy.”

 

As if to punctuate the point, Hikaru opened the door into the living room, where the telephone that Megumi could use was waiting… only to run face-first into a tall, gangly young man with straw-blonde hair.

 

“Hey lil’ sis.” He grinned. “The club got out early today!”

 

Hikaru whimpered with a kind of primal terror, all wrapped up in storm clouds and panic.

 

“Er.” Megumi said dumbly. “Hello? I’m your sister’s girlfriend - I mean, I’m your girlfriend’s sister - I mean, I’m your sister’s  _ friend _ ! Megumi!”

 

“Hello to you too, Megu-chan.” He said gently, stepping around the couple. Hikaru squawked (“You’re not allowed to call her that!”).

 

Megumi looked at the bickering pair, and something in her heart seemed to swell.

 

“Oh, and by the way, Megu-chan.” Hikaru’s brother continued. “You can stay as long as you like.”

 

“No she can’t!” Hikaru maintained.

 

“Hey, you can even stay the night!” Hikaru’s brother walked away down the hall, slipping around a corner.

 

“No she CAN’T, Wataru!” Hikaru screamed after her sibling.

 

“I love you, Hikaru!” Wataru cried back. “And by the way, I called our brothers home for the night, to celebrate the break in our usual way! Have fun!”

 

One might almost think that Wataru was cackling madly even as Hikaru wailed.

 

“This can’t be happening.” She whispered, in the grips of absolute fear. “No…”

 

Megumi hugged Hikaru tightly.

 

“Um. It’s going to be alright?”

 

===

 

Hikaru’s room was actually rather nice, smoothed over with gentle pastel colors and shapes and textures. Megumi flopped down onto the couch, watching Hikaru totter over to the chair by the computer. The garbage can in the corner was piled with broken wood - attracting Megumi’s attention for a moment, before she realized that it was balsa. The wreckage of some toy model or another, abandoned after it had broken.

 

“So are they really that bad?” Megumi asked lightly. “Your family?”

 

Hikaru just half-sobbed. “Yes. Fuck. They couldn’t figure out the tactful thing to say if it was naked in front of them and doing the hokey pokey while covered in napalm.”

 

“Would thermite help?” Megumi said, going for a joke. Hikaru glared at her. “Oh, sorry.”

 

“It’s fine.” Hikaru groaned. “I am just so not ready for this…”

 

Megumi stood up and dashed over to Hikaru, grabbing her into a hug.

 

“Ack!” Hikaru squealed. “Megu-chan!”

 

Megumi laughed, putting Hikaru’s head into the crook of her neck. “It’s going to be okay, you know.”

 

“Probably.” Hikaru whispered. “But still. You should call your parents and get them to pick you up.”

 

“Why?” Megumi asked.

 

“Because soon my brothers are going to come home and be themselves.” Hikaru replied, flopping over to the side as if she had become suddenly boneless.

 

“They can’t be that bad, I’m sure. I won’t be scared off.”

 

“You say that now…” Hikaru groaned.

 

===

 

They weren’t so bad after all. At least, that’s what Megumi thought.

 

They spent half the night playing kid’s tabletop games (“You can never be too old to play a kid’s game!” Said Takeru, Hikaru’s oldest brother. “You can grow old without growing up!” Agreed Masaru, the middle child.)

 

Takeru, the older man that he was, had brought along plenty of alcohol for him and Masaru, leaving Wataru, Megumi, and Hikaru off in one room while the others were drinking.

 

“I need to use the bathroom.” Hikaru said uneasily.

 

And then Hikaru departed for a moment, leaving Megumi and Wataru alone. Megumi coughed.

 

“So… um…” Megumi wondered. “How are you tonight?”

 

“Oh, I’m fine.” Wataru said generously. “You know, I might just go and get a drink too. The more the merrier, right?”

 

“I suppose.” Megumi agreed haltingly. “Um… if you don’t mind me asking… where are all the pictures of Hikaru?”

 

“Oh, we took them down a while back at her request.” Wataru replied. “But - she doesn’t know this - I still have most of them in a photo album.”

 

“Really?” Megumi asked. “Can I see them?”

 

“Of course!” Wataru cried, getting up not for a drink but to grab something from some niche of the household.

 

A moment later, he was back, carrying a thick, nondescript black binder filled with pages and pages of ancient photographs of a tomboy with black hair and a beauty mark.

 

“Why would she want these gone?” Megumi wondered, her fingers brushing a face that had been cute even back then. A picture of a tomboy on a swing set.

 

“Well, she doesn’t like thinking of the time before she transitioned.” Wataru said flippantly. “I can understand that. But… I suppose I’m still attached to those memories, yeah? I… I’m a bit ashamed, but I still want to remember her past, because I had fun with her back then even if she didn’t.”

 

Megumi paused, looking at a picture of Hikaru wearing a suit and in a school band, amongst a throng of boys instead of with the other girls.

 

“Transitioned?”

 

“Yeah, transitioned.” Wataru said. “Wait. You… you did know that Hikaru is trans-”

 

“That’s enough!”

 

Hikaru was standing at the door-frame, trembling in her socks. And Megumi’s stomach was settling somewhere into her feet.

 

“Oh.” Wataru said. “ _ Oh _ . Oh shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize I was outing you-”

 

Hikaru stomped over, ripping the album out of Wataru and Megumi’s hands. “I can’t believe you!” She yelped, looking away from the album like if she dared to meet it’s gaze she would be turned to stone. As if she was holding a gorgon’s head.

 

“Stop.” Megumi said. “Just… stop.”

 

Wataru and Hikaru were both startled into staring at her, and Megumi swallowed.

 

“What does your brother mean, you transitioned?”

 

If she was only being honest with herself, she sort of already knew.

 

“I think I should leave you two alone.” Wataru said slowly. “I’m so, so sorry, Hikaru.”

 

And then there were two.

 

===

 

“So you really were a boy, back on the beach.” Megumi whispered. Hikaru looked at her with eyes bruised by lack of sleep.

 

“Some people would disagree and say I was always a girl on the inside. I don’t know. I suppose you’re right.”

 

“And you’re transsexual.” Megumi continued. “No, I don’t believe that. Your body… you...”

 

“Hormones do a lot.” Hikaru replied. “And… there are ways to hide the things that hormones can’t change.”

 

Looking at Hikaru now, Megumi could actually see a boy if she squinted, if she ignore the whole and only looked at the parts therein. “You… were you trying to lie to me. Why?”

 

Hikaru winced at the speed of molasses. “I… I am a liar. And I don’t expect you to understand or even forgive me.”

 

“I don’t know if I can.” Megumi replied. “But I still want to ask.”

 

Hikaru fiddled with a lock of her black hair -  _ far too long for a boy and somewhat unkempt for a girl  _ \- before she was finally able to speak. “I… a while ago, after I’d transitioned, I had to meet up with my uncle. He… he was never the type to accept people like me.”

 

_ I’m not sure if I’m the type either. _

 

“But… when he met me, he’d completely forgotten that I’d ever been a boy. He assumed that I’d been a girl all along. And that was such a weight off of my back.” Hikaru wiped a tear away. “Sometimes it hurts just remembering that I used to be a boy. And when he didn’t expect me to remember that time, it was a relief. It was easy.”

 

Hikaru dropped the lock of the hair in her hands.

 

“But it was only easy with him because I barely knew him. When I met you again, at first I was happy to let you believe what you wanted. I thought it would be easier for both of us. But then I realized that I cared too much about you, and you cared too much about me. I hated the fact that the truth might tear us apart.”

 

“...you idiot.” Megumi croaked. “You… I fell in love with you when you were a boy, and I fell in love with you when I knew you as a girl. Did you really think I would care?”

 

“Yes.” Hikaru admitted, naked in her own vulnerability. “Because I cared, and I never learned how to stop projecting.”

 

Megumi sighed, and then she went ballistic.

 

“I  _ don’t  _ care about that!” She screamed. “Not anymore! I care that you didn’t trust me, and you thought of yourself as lying, and you kept going anyways. I’m mad that thought you were lying, and lying to my face, and you let yourself do it.” Megumi’s face twisted up. “If you don’t trust me, then I don’t know what to do. I’m sorry.”

 

She pulled herself out of her seat, and headed for the door.

 

“Megumi, please…”

 

“Shut up.” Megumi replied, all her confusion erupting and boiling over. “I need some time to think. I’m sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

 

That was all there was.

“I’m sorry.”


End file.
